Chapter II
The Battle Is Joined
The young page stood frozen in horror, listening to the sounds of violence in disbelief, then turned to run for help. But before he’d gotten more than a few steps, hands clamped down on his arms, dragging him to a halt.
“Whoa, now,” amused voices asked, “where do you think you’re going in such a rush?”
“There—the sounds—battle—my Lord Trahern is being attacked, and Lady Gwenlyn is—” The page broke off to stare at the squires who’d caught him, trying desperately to place them; pages didn’t associate much with squires, who were, after all, several years senior. A stocky towhead, a skinny, brown-haired boy, a dark-haired, slender fellow: Ah, he had it! “Matt, Garin, Wellan—what are you laughing at?”
“That’s no enemy, you idiot!” said towheaded Matt. “That’s His Lordship, yes, and Her Ladyship, too, having at each other.”
The page blinked. “A—a family quarrel? Is that all it is?”
“You new in this castle? You must be new if you haven’t heard them fighting before this. Those are two of the most hot-blooded stubborn folk you could care to meet, and when they disagree—whee!”
“B-but they’re noble!”
The squires laughed. “Does that mean they aren’t allowed to get mad at each other?” brown-haired Garin asked.
“Well, no, but…”
A crash made them all start. “Now what?” Wellan wondered, quickly brushing wild black hair out of his eyes. “Have they started throwing things at each other?”
Matt shook his head. “Not a chance. Throwing things isn’t their style. They are noble, as the kid here says.” The squire hesitated, listening. “Can’t quite make out what they’re saying. What do you think they’re fighting over this time?”
“Her betrothal,” Wellan said with certainty. “What else could it be?”
“Her betrothal,” Matt echoed with wonder. “Who would dare marry a fierce one like that?”
Garin shrugged. “Someone ‘smitten by her charm,’ as the minstrels put it. Hey, don’t give me those looks. Our Lady Gwenlyn may not be one of those pretty little perfect creatures the minstrels rave about—”
“You mean, those perfectly brainless creatures,” Wellan corrected drily. “One thing our Lady Gwenlyn isn’t is brainless.”
“She sure isn’t. And maybe she isn’t a raging beauty, or whatever they call it, but Lady Gwenlyn isn’t exactly hard to look at, either.”
“Besides,” Matt added, “she’s got a good heart underneath all that fire. A pretty clever wit, too.”
“Right,” Garin agreed “Our Gwenlyn can manage to charm anyone she sets her mind to, and you all know it.”
“Huh. Anyone save her father,” Matt muttered.
Angry voices still roared and rumbled in the background. Garin shrugged. “Five to one her ladyship wins this one,” he said.
###
“This is ridiculous! Ridiculous, I say!” Count Trahern, tall and elegant and blazing with rage, was as impressive as a great, handsome bird of prey.
Gwen—Lady Gwenlyn Mared Rhona Gwinerya—wasn’t impressed. “Ridiculous, is it? This is my future we’re discussing, my life!”
“Don’t be so melodramatic!”
“What do you expect of me? You’ve bargained away my entire future!”
Her father gave a great sigh, visibly struggling to calm himself. “You knew the day of your betrothal would come eventually.”
“Of course I did, curse it!”
“Gwenlyn!”
“After all,” she forged on, “I’m nothing much, am I? Nothing but a girl. Why should I expect to have any say in what happens to me? It’s not as though I was actually worth something. Except as a pawn in political games, of course. I’m just a—a—cursed bargaining chip!”
“Don’t be a—”
“Don’t try to deny it! We both know—”
“Stop this stupid self-pity right now!”
“It’s not—”
“I said, stop it! Gwenlyn, I could have married again, I could have fathered another child—”
“I wish you had!” But then Gwen added, almost softly, “I know you’ve been lonely since—since Mother died. And I—I hate seeing you alone. It’s been nearly twelve years, Father. I wish you would let yourself find someone else to love.”
She saw pain flicker in his dark eyes, but the count answered with cold dignity, “What I do or do not do with my life is not your affair. I have no other child, and that is as it is. I raised you as my heir, I gave you the best education. I even, curse me for a fool, encouraged you to use your brain.”
“Yes. That’s why—”
“Then use it!” he shouted. “I could have married you off to some doddering old idiot or a monster who’d beat you every day. Instead, I go out of my way to arrange a fine match for you—”
Here we go again. “A fine match!” Gwen yelled back. “He’s nothing but a boy!”
“Ha! That boy, as you call him, is a full year your senior.”
“But he’s a nobody,” Gwen protested, “a commoner without one drop of noble blood.”
“Let me remind you,” her father countered, “that he is both a full Bard and a hero.”
“Some hero,” Gwen sniffed. “He was made count just because he happened to be in the right place at the right time!”
“And knew what to do about it when that time came. And won royal favor, I might add. Gwenlyn, like it or not, he is an important political figure. And I will not have you make us both look like idiots!”
“Idiots, is it? He’s the fool if he thinks he’ll marry me!”
With that, Gwen stormed off before her father could shape a suitable retort, hardly noticing the squires she hurried past. But their whispers reached her: “A draw, by the gods, a true draw!”
Why, those little idiots were wagering on us!
For an instant she wavered, torn between raging at them and laughing at their nerve. But if she stopped now, her father would almost certainly overtake her, and Gwen just did not have the heart to continue the battle.
We’re always fighting these days, she thought wearily. Over politics, over castle affairs—even over the state of the weather!
It hadn’t always been like this. Gwen could barely remember her mother: twelve years was, after all, a long time. But surely there had been peaceful days back then. She seemed to recall days when father and mother and daughter were one harmonious, cheerful family. And even after, there had been times when she and her father had laughed together more than they fought. Days when they weren’t always challenging each other. Days when they were happy. Her vision suddenly blurred, and Gwen fiercely blinked and blinked again, refusing to weep.
I don’t want it to be like this! I don’t want either of us to be unhappy, truly I don’t. I try to be properly meek and submissive, but I—I just can’t be that way. Father, Father, I love you dearly, but if this goes on much longer I swear one of us is going to kill the other!
How could she possibly escape this tangle? By forcing herself into a submissive mold, no matter how much it hurt? Gwen snorted, refusing to lie to herself. As soon ask a hawk to turn into a dove! She was never going to fit into the dull little niche society seemed to demand of a noblewoman. But what else was there for her to do? Marry? Marry that nobody?
Ha. He’d probably try to rule over me like a tyrant, the arrogant son of a—
“Bah!” Gwen said aloud and, heedless of her fine linen gown, threw herself down on her knees. Every castle had its herb garden, ruled over by the castle lady, and she, perforce, ruled this one—and spent a good deal of time taking out her frustration on it. Tossing her wild black mane impatiently back over her shoulders, Gwen began savagely to pull weeds.
But slowly her fierceness faded. What was to become of her? A commoner could do pretty much anything she dared. Gwen had even seen a few women warriors.
Oh, right. Some warrior I’d make. What would I do, terrorize enemies with my little belt knife?
No. A forced marriage or a cloistered life—there really weren’t any other choices for a noblewoman. There certainly wasn’t any choice she could imagine that included…happiness.
Surrounded by greenery, Gwenlyn saw none of it. She sat staring instead at a future that looked all too bleak.
###
“Oh no, my lord, oh no, my lord,
I shall not marry thee.
For I shall bed my bandit bold
And live both wild and free!”
Kevin and Naitachal, riding side by side through the forest, roared out that last stanza together, then burst into laughter.
“Fortunate none of the courtiers heard that,” Kevin gasped out, and Naitachal corrected: “Fortunate Master Aidan didn’t hear that!”
“Oh, yes!” Kevin agreed. “I can just see his scowls. Trying to prove Bardic Magic doesn’t work on the tone-deaf, are we?’ But hey now, a Bard can’t be elegant all the time!”
Naitachal grinned. “We just proved a Bard can’t be in tune all the time, either! Lucky our horses didn’t throw us in indignation.”
“Speaking of horses,” Kevin added, patting the neck of his mount, “it’s time to give them another rest.”
Naitachal slipped gracefully to the forest floor. “They earned one, listening to us.”
Kevin followed, stretching stiff muscles. “There’s nothing wrong with the occasional bawdy ballad, and—what is it?”
The elf had been glancing warily about, alert as a predator. “Nothing,” he said after a moment. “I was just being cautious. Remember how Lydia would scout out escape routes every time we stopped?”
Kevin nodded. “I thought it was silly back then. Not any longer.” He snapped lead ropes to the halters the horses were wearing under their bridles, then looped the ropes securely about a tree near a good stand of grass. ‘There. Graze a bit.”
The journey so far had been more like one extended camping trip than anything else. Kevin paused, realizing with a jolt of surprise that he never had had a chance to travel just for the joy of it. Now, alone with a good friend and the chance for good music, the Bard could almost trick his mind into thinking this was a light, rambling-for-the-sake-of-rambling trip.
Almost. If it wasn’t for the nagging guilt he felt at up and abandoning the castle that had been given into his charge—even if said castle could function quite well without him.
And if it wasn’t for the quiet little fact that there was, indeed, a goal to this trip: a dark-haired, keen-eyed potential bride to whom he just might have to tie his life forever—
Oh gods.
Naitachal had settled himself comfortably on a grassy knoll, fingers idly running over the strings of his travelling harp, waking soft, sweet falls of notes. Kevin forced thoughts of What Might Be out of his mind as best he could, and sat beside the elven Bard, taking his lute out of its protective case, tuning it with what was by now unconscious ease. There weren’t too many compositions for harp and lute, particularly since the little travelling harp had no sharps or flats, but that hadn’t stopped them so far. After a few false starts, the two Bards improvised a cheerful, deceptively simple melody that sent a small shiver of delight up Kevin’s spine.
What of Gwenlyn, though? Did she like music? What if she was tone-deaf? Worse, what if she actually hated music and—and—
Kevin’s fingers stumbled on the strings.
“Thinking about your intended?” Naitachal asked slyly.
“Trying not to. Naitachal, what do I do if I can’t stand her? Or if she can’t stand me?”
“Don’t look at me for an answer! I’m hardly an expert on your human romances. Or on any of your human ways, for that matter.”
“I thought at Bracklin—”
“The folk of Bracklin accepted me because I was clearly a friend and student of Master Aidan, but that didn’t mean they took me into their confidences. Besides,” the Dark Elf added with a grin, “I doubt that the matters of commoners and nobles have all that much in common.”
“But I’m not—I mean, I wasn’t born noble, I don’t understand how nobles think, either, and—and—”
“Hush. From everything I’ve seen, Kevin, you’re doing a fine job as count. And if this Gwenlyn doesn’t appreciate what she’s getting,” Naitachal continued, humor glinting in his blue eyes, “well then, she doesn’t deserve so fine a lad!”
“Huh.” Studying his lute, Kevin said with forced lightness, “What do Dark Elves know about human women, anyway? They’re so wrapped up in their sinister plots they wouldn’t know a pretty woman from—”
“Stop.”
Kevin glanced up in surprise at the chill tone. Naitachal’s face had suddenly gone cold and still. “Do not jest about them,” the Dark Elf warned quietly. “The Nithathili are still my kin. And they hate me for escaping what they saw as my destiny as a Necromancer—and for denying them my share of Dark Power.”
“They…aren’t hunting you, are they?”
Naitachal shrugged slightly. “Not yet. Not as far as I know. But who knows what may happen? In their eyes, particularly those of my own clan, I am the worst land of traitor, one who has willingly turned from the Darkness they worship to the Light. If they ever should choose to hunt me, if they should catch me…”
He shrugged again, eyes so bleak and empty that Kevin shuddered, remembering with a shock, this is the sorcerer who could age a man to instant death with a touch, just for a moment not at all sure that Naitachal had quite banished all traces of Necromantic magic. “Well, then,” the young count said with all the defiance he could muster, “we won’t let them catch you!”
To his relief, he heard Naitachal chuckle and saw life come back into the blue eyes. “Thank you, oh great and mighty hero.” The elf got to his feet, slipping his harp back into its protective covering. “So now, our horses look rested enough. Come, let’s continue our ride.”
Kevin scrambled up. “Ah, wait, I have a thought. We’re pretty well travel-stained by now.”
“True,” Naitachal agreed with a fastidious sniff. “And we reek of horse. I trust your lady will have enough patience to let us clean ourselves up a bit before you start your wooing.”
“She’s not my lady. And you’re missing my point.”
“Which is?”
“We were planning to arrive at Count Trahern’s castle as Count Kevin and Bard Naitachal.”
Naitachal raised a wry brow. “Which, I take it, we’re not going to be any longer?”
“No. I’ve changed my mind about that. If I meet Lady Gwenlyn as a count, as her—uh—her betrothed-to-be, we’re not going to be able to be honest with each other. We’ll be forced to play the roles noble society insists upon: polite, formal and totally artificial. But I—I want a chance to judge her honestly, and to let her judge me, without rank getting in the way.”
“I don’t think I like the sound of this.”
“Wait, hear me out. We won’t enter Count Trahern’s castle as nobles, but as common musicians, wandering minstrels, the sort of folk who are usually welcome anywhere but who aren’t really noticed unless they’re actually performing.”
“And you think your lady won’t notice you until you want her to notice you.” The Dark Elf’s voice was carefully empty of emotion. “So you’ll have a chance to watch her without any artifices getting in the way.”
“She’s not my lady. And yes, that’s exactly it.”
“I’m not too sure about this. If—”
“It’ll be easy!” Kevin interrupted hastily. “We’ve done enough successful role-playing when we were out trying to rescue poor Charina.”
Humor flashed in Naitachal’s eyes. “Indeed. I seem to remember that you made quite a fetching dancing girl.”
Kevin shuddered. “Uh, well, we did what we had to do. We won’t have to do anything as drastic as that this time around.”
“Count Trahern has never actually met you, has he?”
“He’s never even seen me. Except, of course, for that stupid, stylized miniature his servant insisted on taking. And as for you…well. . . you aren’t the easiest person to ignore,” Kevin said tactfully, “but…ah…”
“But four years isn’t enough time for everyone to have heard of the oddity, the Dark Elf who’s turned Bard,” Naitachal finished blandly. “The one who was the companion of Kevin, the hero Bard. True enough. Our clothes look tired enough to be credible as minstrels’ wear, and it’s simple enough for me to hide what I am with a hooded cloak and a long-sleeved tunic. But how are you going to explain away our swords and these fine-blooded horses?”
Kevin grinned. “That’s easy. They’re the gifts of grateful patrons. You see? It’ll all be just as easy.”
Naitachal shook his head. “You make it all sound so simple. But I think you’re missing an important point: starting off a relationship by pretense just doesn’t seem wise to me.”
“It’s not pretense, not really. And there may not be any relationship unless I get that chance to know Lady Gwenlyn fairly.”
“Fairly,” the Dark Elf echoed.
“Oh, come now, Naitachal! It’s only a small deceit, a very small deceit. And…well…things will turn out fine, you’ll see.”
“You hope,” Naitachal said drily, and swung into the saddle.